Miriam Makeba Quotes

So many of my friends are still trying to get record deals, and I've had one for 10 years now, where my only goal is to make the best music I can make. I've been very lucky. I have great faith that I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be, and whatever happens is going to be absolutely right for me.

I have so much gratitude that I get to do this for a living and that I actually have fans who come to the shows and buy the records and support me online.

Of course I think we're most thankful for 'Shake It,' because it's given us a lot of opportunities, helped us pay some bills and brought us pretty far in life. And it's fun to perform live.

My dream is to take the Indian independent music scene to an international level. People like Alisha Chinai, Baba Sehgal and Daler Mehndi took it to a very high level. My ultimate target is to win a Grammy. I don't want to primarily be a Bollywood playback singer.

I wouldn't have known when I was a teenager that when I was coming up to being a sixty-year-old woman that I'd be making music, I'd be recording music, talking about music, and incorporating my views on the world into the music-making. So it's a very rarefied place to be, and I'm very grateful for that.

England is the first country that I've had a no. 1 album in, so it is now officially my home away from home.

I'm grateful to my audience, that there are people who will buy a ticket and come and see us play and who essentially support me and this life of music.

...we should be grateful for them because without our family—the ancestors we descend from, the cousins we see once a year, the loves our lives we see every day—life is pretty boring.

I've been touring every year since the band broke up. It's my job. It's what I love to do. So I'm all good with it.

Country music fans are the best everywhere and they've always made me feel like I'm at home, no matter what zip code I'm in. I just want to thank them from the bottom of my heart for blessing me with such an incredible career that I truly enjoy.

I've been on the road for so long that it's a part of my being. Even after all these years, I love playing. I love recording. I love writing. I love rehearsing. I love touring. I love all that stuff.

Traveling all over the country and all over the world, I think you've got a lot of pop acts and a lot of rock acts that are making a point of traveling to different places and making people aware of their music and their shows and the whole deal and I think country music has always sort of stayed, for the most part, in the states.

Holy Mother Church teaches us to end the year and also our days with an examination of conscience...to be grateful and to ask for forgiveness.

My books have sold largely in England, have been translated into many languages, and passed through several editions in foreign countries. I have heard it said that the success of a work abroad is the best test of its enduring value. I doubt whether this is at all trustworthy; but judged by this standard my name ought to last for a few years.

I'm really fortunate. I grew up in a wonderful household with great Irish Catholic parents.

I'm really grateful. But I never had the rock star dream. I thought it would be cool to be a modern-day composer.

I think I've far exceeded what I ever thought I could possibly do. I'm almost shocked that I'm still around after all of these years . . . and always grateful that I get another turn to do something.

So many people have listened to my song because of it - I'm beyond grateful. It's funny because when I met Spencer and Dustin, they were so excited to meet me, but I was like you're the celebrities to me - they're the ones with a video has over 10 million views.

That's what you join a band for, is to make music. Not to sit around and have five years off. We're not getting any younger.

I've been approached by major labels every single year of my existence as an artist. Since 1996.

I was talking to Alan Jackson. He had his second Greatest Hits album. He said, You don't ever get into this really thinking you're gonna make it.

Now, [hip-hop/grime artists] Stormzy, Skepta, or the Section Boyz have to be validated by Drake, Rihanna or Beyoncé. They're rolled into this one urban culture bubble; it's not really to do with, "I'm specifically f - ked off about my country and what's going on in my town." We're very much only showing success to artists who impress American artists, and I'm one of them.

Being a solo artist is what I do. It's what I've been doing for the last 20 years and a bit before then.

If you're 22 years old and you can't believe you're even in the position to have a career making music, the first thing you're going to think is: Maintain. Don't lose it. And that's precisely what causes you to lose everything.

My first record - it was 1991. I was 16 years old. My first album came out when I was 20. So, I've been here that long and I still have the passion to do it.